


Breakage

by created_clockwork



Category: Don't Hug Me I'm Scared (Short Film), dhmis - Fandom
Genre: DHMIS, F/M, Padlock, this is sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-16
Updated: 2014-04-16
Packaged: 2018-01-19 13:56:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1472329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/created_clockwork/pseuds/created_clockwork
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Paige has been evading Tony, and he wants to know why</p>
            </blockquote>





	Breakage

**Author's Note:**

> I was trying out a new writing style and this happened  
> This is the first fanfiction I've written in months here you go

  She seemed to have been avoiding him for a while now, gradually distancing herself more and more as the hours ticked by. He tried not to care, but it was becoming increasingly difficult to overlook; what had begun as simple refusal to acknowledge his existence in any given situation grew into active evasion, and now rare was the occasion whereby he would even run into her at all.

She was planning something. And he was going to make sure he got there first.

It didn’t take as long to find her as he had anticipated. Sitting, alone, in a dimly-lit room, purposefully and aggressively taking one of his pocket-watches to pieces.

-

  She had been avoiding him for a while now, gradually distancing herself more and more and filling her time with pointless activity, even more so than usual. He had almost certainly noticed by now and she couldn’t find it in herself to care: as long as she could stay out of his way for the duration of this hunch, his suspicions did not concern her.

In her heart, she knew that that wasn’t how it was going to play out at all. Eventually he was going to confront her.

She resolved to steal his attention with an appropriated pocket-watch. When he arrived, she doubted he had even realised it was missing.

-

“You’ve been rather withdrawn these past few weeks, my dear.”

“Yes.”

“Is there a reason for it?”

“Yes.”

“Are you going to answer with anything other than single-word phrases?”

“If you ask the right questions.”

“That’s not very creative of you.”

“I can see why you might think that.”

  He sighed. Clearly, she was not about to offer any kind of satisfying reaction any time soon. She hadn’t even looked up at him, so intent was she on hollowing out his precious timepiece. It was painful to watch, but he wasn’t prepared to give her a satiating response until he had elicited the same from her.

“What are you doing?”

“Killing time.”

  She actually smirked as she said this, evidently very pleased with herself. It was a small and essentially meaningless gesture, but it was a start. He could work with that. He paced the room to where she was sitting and loomed over her as she worked, hoping she would be more inclined to respond if she felt he was threatening her. She paused for a moment to acknowledge his feet, before promptly redirecting her attention to the pulling the watch apart. He immediately began to regret standing so close; from here he could see the full extent of the damage her careless, inky little fingers had exacted upon such a beautiful specimen of metalwork, and it took all manner of self-restraint not to rip it from her filthy hands and demonstrate to her exactly how such a spectacle had felt to him.

“You shouldn’t steal things, my dear. It’s incredibly rude.”

“I am aware.”

A sequence of small, metallic clinks sounded as she dropped another cog on the floor.

“You seem more destructive than usual today.”

Another set of clinks.

“May I ask why?”

Clink-clink-clink.

“My dear—“ He crouched before her, taking a gentle hold of her chin and coaxing her to look at him. She complied, completely unfazed. “—I simply wish to know why you are destroying my watch.”

  The statement seemed to hang in the air between them for a short while, heavy and cold and threatening. She blinked and looked down, planning to return to the task at hand, but his hold tightened and he jerked her head back up, forcing her focus onto him. His free hand closed over the tiny fist within which the offending item was concealed. He chuckled darkly.

“I must say- it is rather refreshing to see you at a loss for words.”

  Her heart was pounding, and she suddenly became acutely aware of how closely she must resemble a deer caught in headlights. She wracked her brain for some kind of retaliation but found nothing; a surge of adrenaline evoked a crushing grip on the broken watch, and she winced as the metal dug painfully into her skin. He noticed.

“Give me my watch back, my darling.”

  He let go of her hand and held out an open palm. With some reluctance, she returned it. It was only fair, she supposed- after all, he was right: the watch did, in fact, belong to him.

  He let go of her face and turned the pocket-watch over in his hands, inspecting each crack and crevice, his expression unreadable. After a minute or so, he pocketed it and diverted his attention back to her.

“Would you care to dance?”

  She froze. He had her cornered- if she tried to refuse, he would instantly realise that something was wrong. Granted, he probably already knew: but she was not prepared to confirm his suspicions just yet. When she looked back up at him, he was offering her his hand.

Steadying her shaking fingers, she sealed the oath. A wide, predatory smile spread across his face.

“Excellent.”

  He pulled her to her feet, his movements swift and concise- an infuriating contrast to her own nervous instability. He didn’t comment on it, and he didn’t need to: the corner of his mouth twitched ever so slightly, contorting his smile from one of inviting excitement to one of sadistic triumph, and she realised instantly that she had lost this battle before it had even begun. A clean, metallic ringing, and a thousand possible outcomes ran through her head, none of them ending well for her, she directed her attention to the weapon and considered that if she could just get hold of it or even so much as get it out of _his_ possession she might even hold the barest possibility of a hope of a chance that she might make it out of this ali-

“Oh.” 

  Was that her voice? It had sounded like her voice. She looked down.

  The hilt of his sword was protruding from her stomach. She had been so wrapped up in working out how to evade this that she had completely neglected to watch him lunge straight at her with exactly this in mind. Nonetheless, the victorious grin on his face told her he had been expecting her to at least try to get out of the way, and she silently cursed herself for the split second of a lapse in attention that had cost her everything. The unpleasant clinging of damp fabric spread across her chest and she felt her legs fail her.

He caught her as she fell, and helped her to the floor.

“Come now, my dear, you’ve recovered from far worse than this. Although, I have to say, that was astonishingly easy. I’ve never known you not to put up _something_ of a fight, however pitiful your attempts may be most of the time.” He pulled the blade from her body with a jolt, lying her down with an uncharacteristic tenderness, and got to his feet. He inspected the sword, scowling a little at the viscous amalgamation of crimson and ebony staining the usually oh-so-pristine metal. Sheathing it, he redirected his attention to her.

“Are you still down there? There’s no use wallowing, my dear, I have already emerged victorious.”

  She barely acknowledged a word he was saying. She moved a hand to her chest and felt the ragged edges of her skin, the unfamiliar sting of severed nerves surging through her body and making her wince.

“You will heal up soon enough, my darling. Give it some ti-” He stopped, intrigued by the vacant expression of pain flashing across her face. He knelt beside her and leaned in to watch her more closely.

She shied away from him almost absently, unable to draw her eyes away from the wound, pondering how horribly empty and unfulfilling the sensation was.

“Oh my. You can’t, can you? That’s what this has been about.” He laughed in delighted disbelief. “You’ve been avoiding me because you knew you couldn’t recover this time.”

She mused over his utter inability to shut up even at the best of times as blood loss began to take its toll and her vision grew hazy.

“I _wonder_ why that could be. Perhaps-”

She slumped on her back, now unable to hold her own weight. He loomed over her, grinning, his voice little more than a vicious hiss.

“ _Perhaps no-one needs you anymore._ ”

She no longer had the energy to feel angry. She no longer had the energy to retaliate. She no longer had the energy t…

  He stared at her for a solid minute, taking in every little detail of her: the gentle curve of her fingers draped over her wound; the heavy-lidded glassy eyes, now void of their bright vitality; the frayed fabric of her dress, still damp with stolen life.

  There she lay, the embodiment of an eternity of attempts on each other’s lives, the ultimate end to every torturous little second she had wrought upon his existence.  He tilted his head with a small smile, melancholy and with something akin to affection.

“It’s a shame you had to go like this, my dear. I’d rather hoped you’d make a little more of a show of it. This almost doesn’t do you justice.” A hand hovered over her face. He was slightly reluctant to touch her- the idea of it felt somewhat impious. “You do look so very lovely without that wretched smirk twisting up your features. If only you hadn’t been so contemptuous- who knows, I might even have found you tolerable.” He traced a finger along her lower lip, just barely making contact. “Alas, what was fated has been finished. We both knew your time would come eventually. I’d say I’ll miss you, but that wouldn’t quite be true.”

  He withdrew his hand and gazed down at her for a while, some allusion to fondness softening his expression. The lack of cynical retort made for a very pleasant silence.

“That said, I did enjoy your company at times. You, if infrequently, proved yourself to be relatively entertaining.”

Ah. Silence.

“I suppose I should expect to feel some iota of loss. We have spent so much time together, after all.”

“I won’t count on it, though.”

The silence felt unnatural.

“Grieving is a waste of time.”

Had that watch always been so loud?

“Much like you, my dear.”

Two watches were out of sync. Ticktick-tocktock-ticktick-tocktock.

“If only we’d done this sooner. I could have found a much better use for all those wasted hours.”

He’d have to fix them. One of them. One was okay. Which one?

  His gaze drifted to the assortment of cogs lying abandoned on the floor, stained black with her fingerprints but ultimately unharmed. Fixable. Everything broken could be fixed. He picked one up and turned it over in his hands. With the right parts, everything broken could be fixed. His eyes locked on her. Everything broken could be fixed.

**Author's Note:**

> It's a bit pretentiously written I'm sorry


End file.
